Setting an EQ pedal to get the best tone can be tricky, but understanding how and when to use an EQ pedal couldn't be simpler. This video looks at 5 ways to effectively use the BOSS EQ-200, a ten band graphic EQ, to improve your guitar sound. BOSS EQ-200: www.thomann.de/gb/boss_eq_200... www.boss.info/uk/products/eq-... Thanks to Boss for sponsoring this video. #CSGuitars #EQ200 #BOSS #EQpedals More from CSGuitars: Gain access to exclusive content at: www.patreon.com/csguitars Buy CSGuitars Merchandise: www.csguitars.co.uk/store Website: www.csguitars.co.uk Contact: colin@csguitars.co.uk
Great video as always Colin. I stumbled into EQ uses after chasing Josh Homme's tone for years specifically, the tone on Songs for the Deaf. Once going so far as buying a very used Ampeg VT22 that was way to loud, weighed 100 lbs, and required a small fortune I didn't have to bring it up to spec. I later settled on a Catalinbred SFT, but I still could get that "rip" I was after, but after watching the Sound on Sound video featuring the producer of that album and how he generally got the tones I knew what I needed. As soon as I slapped an EQ on that pedal and boosted the mids I had it. From then on, an EQ is one of my favorite "secret sauce" pedals, and is a Swiss Army knife in the studio. Cheers!
I have an MXR 10 band eq and I use it quite sparingly as well. These can be especially effective if someone is using several different gain pedals. Since the tone of each of the pedals can be radically different, once you get a decent tone set, the eq can help balance the ones that need the most help. Also, there are what are called 'parametric' eq pedals out there that, rather than isolate single bands of eq to cut or boost, they take entire frequency ranges and boost/cut them. The drawback to these pedals is that you usually only get 3 or 4 ranges to adjust rather than the 7 to 10 you would normally get with a 'graphic' eq pedal. That being said, most mfx pedals these days generally have both graphic and parametric eq options in them, so if the Boss EQ-200 is too expensive, a pedal like the Zoom MS-70 has several different eq options in it that work just as well.
Great video as always mate !!! Thanks for sharing your knowledge and for shedding light on the use of this pedal. I definitively need an EQ pedal on my rig now
Personally, I boost the shittt out of mids (and aggressively *cut the bass*... this might be the most significant aspect) BEFORE distortion for a tiiiiight n heavy tone
@@TylrVncnt Lol, my comment was more a joke, but yeah I've also especially when jamming with my buddy , boost the mids more. It helps to bring some fuller tones to the sound. but when I am jamming on my own then I cut the mids again for that thrashy tone
I work as a sound engineer (mainly live sound but a little bit studio stuff too) and I am a big fan of reductive usage of EQ. "Take away few frequencys that sound bad, and the leftover WILL sound good." Fully parametric or only semi parametric, I always do it like this: turn the gain of that freq.band up, mess around with the frequency knob (EYES CLOSED) and find where it sounds the most bad, then stop there, and turn the gain down of that freq.band. I really rarely use EQ to boost anything, and I think specially guitarists should use this method primarily. That is why I thought that your "Target Mids"-pedal was so great product, but as u said, if your tone sucks, then no amount of EQing isn't gonna fix it, its the rest of your signal that needs to be fixed. Great video and Terveisiä from Finland!
Nice! I think that reducive EQ in live sound works better and especially when mixing monitors. When u boost freqs, (mainly highs and high mids) they can (and often will) cause feedback. But if u are not boosting the highs, but rather cutting the unwanted muddynes, then u can just turn the whole monitor up and that will cause a little bit less feedback. Of course in studio with no live monitoring feedback problems and with good gear that isnt noisey, boosting EQ is fun and more effective and faster way to get your tones to sound good. And I totally dig that
@@JuveriSetila also its way harder to get low end in your mixes (target market is a lot of headphones and bluetooth speakers) so to get low end out of i.e. a kickdrum you almost have to boost
They don't use roman numerals and the wikipedia article goes very in-depth. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alnico The gist is that the higher the number the stronger the magnetic pull is. The stronger the magnetic pull, the higher the potential output the pickup has. Alnico 2 magnets give the most sustain because the weaker magnetic pull lets the strings ring out for longer.
@@ErebosGR When they 1st replicated Eddies Frankenstien the pickup show 0 on the meter. They thought they messed up but it was a low output AlNiCo ii magnet i've gone almost all Alnico 2 & 3's .
@@utubehound69/videos 0 what? Ohm? The magnet doesn't affect the resistance of the pickup. Remove the magnet and the pickup would measure at exactly the same Ohm as before. If they measured output voltage, then a very weak magnet could show close to 0V, if their meter wasn't very accurate. Only with a non-existent magnet would the pickup measure 0 mV in output. Sounds like another bullshit story that gets passed around without making any sense.
if you love math and story problems, then yes you should have. That's what the whole deal is really all about. There is a practical side too. Being a natural tinkerer is half of the battle. I saw math wizards go thru the program with me who aced the tests (always all story problems all the time) but couldn't find the hot end of the soldering iron or even assemble simple crap in the labs. fvcking useless math students. Use these videos and do a bit of further research and you will get all the EE theory you need. (except maybe for tubes. those are special). stick with colin. Also there are a lot of astute commenters in these vids.
@@alexandert696 depends what you're doing, but the vast majority of the math is algebra. There's a linear relationship between voltage and current for Ohmic devices, exponential for BJT, and quadratic for MOSFETs. There is some calculus involved in the derivation for these concepts, but it isn't *too* difficult (unless you're doing antenna design or something).
You can always start learning! Start from basic physics (electromagnetics), a simple circuit analysis course (they offer them online for free), move into solid state physics & semiconductors, learn about PN junctions, BJTs, MOSFETs, feedback, and op-amp design, and you'll be good for pedal design. You can always go the digital route and take an introductory digital design course, learn a language to program an FPGA (Verilog or VHDL) or a microcontroller (C, C++, even Python now), and create some fun gadgets this way, but you'd still need to know some circuit design to create the board to power your FPGA or microcontroller. Anyways, there are a ton of resources online, so you can definitely learn this stuff without going to school.
@@stephenjbro that's true, for the little I have done of electrical engineering on my own, it felt Indeed that the math is not too complex. I'd imagine it gets worse with DSP related stuff :)
ESPECIALLY with a Hot Rod Deluxe. The drive channels on it were SO poorly EQ'd from the factory, but I dropped a Boss GE-7 in the effects loop, and it's made a whole world of difference. Doesn't sound like canned dogshit anymore.
I use my MXR ten band EQ in the effects loop and it does a great job. In front? Meh. It's okay. But, putting an EQ in the loop really makes it come alive (and your sound, as well).
That's exactly what I do too. Take a high gain noisy amp, 10 band EQ to pump in the frequencies with a noise reduction unit thru the loop and you're set.
@@Fedethedangerous95 He plays a very high frequency (around 16KHz) in the background while he says "Your tinnitus damaged hearing." Tinnitus is a health condition a sufferer's symptoms are often that they hear a loud ringing noise (high frequency) which has not been emitted from an outside source. [1] It is a joke about the condition to try and describe one of the frequency bands. [1] NHS: www.nhs.uk/conditions/tinnitus/
Good work young man...Im an old duffer...who's enjoyed a life as a pro musician..if these videos were around when I was starting out I could have saved a lot of time.. essentially learning the hard way was how we did it back then. Cheers.
This pedal is seriously tempting. I have a modded ge7 on my board, I mainly use it to even out the bass between the clean and gain channel of my amp, an unusual use Maybe but it is necessary with my current rig, the clean channel has soo much more low end than the gain channel. I also use it to tune to whatever room I'm playing in. Sometimes the slightest bump in the 800hz range can be the difference between being able to hear your tone clearly or not in some rooms.
I got the boss eq-200 last week. All I can say is that once you go Eq, you ll never go back. It really expands your tone, especially for clean tones. The door has been opened and it’s a whole new world!
I have a TATA: What does sag actually sound like? I know what it is from a technical standpoint but I am having a hard time trying to hear in my head what sag isolated actually sounds like.
Yet AGAIN- Gold info here that actually works- as with passive vs active pickups,and tube screamer as boost - now EQ in the loop with minor adjustments - excellent stuff man devoid of BS 👍🏻
“They can’t boost what’s not there” & the idea of take away bad first before adding good... BEST advice for any mixing! Most sound engineers try to aim a few spots at 0 as the loudest and then bring up everything else to match/balance. Only then bumping a few small spots over 0 only as necessary. Notice at 11:33 and on how his EQ is balanced around the midline. Tasty mixes, but only making a great sound even better... not making “chicken salad” as the saying goes. 🤙
All praise the Algorithm. I have the MXR 10 band EQ and found out through much experimentation that this is my best tone. All amp EQ at noon. Dial in the best clean tone with no effects. Then set the EQ pedal to a flat line, with the amp controls still at noon, then find what works. Then start adding in one pedal at a time, in different combinations and different places in the chain. There are two vital sliders on the MXR. Gain and volume. The gain will boost the clean signal to the point it breaks up, pushing the amp into overdrive. Then you're cooking with gas.
One quick tip from a sound engineer, while lower mids(the warmth and the "balls" of the tone) is usually the part that we first target, there is no reason to have anywhere betwen 30-150 boost for a 6 string guitar, since usually sound engineers cut those, in generally (many variables) those are mud, that you don't need in a full mix, I repeat IN A FULL MIX. So be aware at the mid bass territory, since it's mud usually and it just makes the mix unclear, leave that for the bass to handle and for the sound engineer to mix that.
Yay someone else that defines bass, mids and treble frequency ranges at the same exact spot as me (0-300hz, 300-4khz, 4khz-20khz.) We're definitely right.
A cool trick I figured out for myself. To find out approx. what frequencies your knobs are adjusting. Record your playing, however you want, into a DAW. Pull up a visual EQ graph. Play normal. Adjust one of the knobs to the max and play again. Look at what areas changed the most.
7:55 I’ve found this to be so true. For several years I tried getting my Supro TremoVerb to work with an MXR 10 band EQ pedal, but found a world of difference in my tone when I switched to my current Princeton Reverb. Now I don’t even use the EQ pedal on my Princeton, but reserve it for the Right side of my stereo rig to my Champ to sculpt it’s tone. Seriously though, it’s worth the effort and experimentation to find an amp that really fits the tone in your head. I had to compare both those amps together to know, but when I did, it was pretty clear that the rest of my rig was better suited to be amplified through the Princeton.
First I thought this guy is just some sound tech one of milion but after seeing that right wristband so tight thinking his even equalising his own blood flow I now know your eq master. Great video really helped me understand more about tone frequency.
Subscribing to your channel has helped my brain process a better understanding of your motherland's heavy dialect. Especially for watching movies made in your part of the world. I know the language is English based, but my ears are not locking on to what some words are spoken, and I am a college educated American. Your guitar knowledge and playing ability is tops. Your knowledge of the physics behind electronic wizardry suggests to me you have a college degree in sound engineering. Thank you for being on YT and more people should be your subscribers because your tutorials are top shelf.
With the “boost wide, cut narrow” thing, the Josh Homme “Songs for the Deaf” Studio Tour thing Springs to mind. Maxed out 1 mid band in 2 consecutive graphic eq pedals into an Ampeg. Possibly an example of a “all rules exist to be broken” mentality?
Okay, Here we go again. You use your Bass, mid and treble on your amp to get your basic tone, Then you use your resonance and presence to adjust your tones tone. And then! you use your EQ pedal to spice up the tones tone tone. Imagine a steak, you cook it with the amplifier and its ready to eat, But you can always use a sauce AKA the resonance and presence, And then you add the salt and pepper AKA the EQ pedal.
I find them really handy if I am using an amp that isn't mine and I can't tweak all that much (like at a jam night). Just gives me some control from the pedal board!
I Had a HIWATT Custom Lead 100 Half stack years ago. I left it unmodified internally. The resulting tone was SOOO Trebly, even with the tone controls reducing the highs and some mids, also Presence control at zero!! ( was playing a Univox Strat copy. Very trebly also) One day, I wired up my Radio Shack 7-band EQ into my signal chain and dropped (attenuated) 75% of the high freqs and some upper mids out of the signal, and like one Live sound guy mentioned, adjusted to "feel". My rig never sounded so sweet!! I wasn't hip to all the capacitor substitutions I could also have done to the Amp and guitar internal electronics, at the time, so, I ended up selling my HIWATT for something smaller, with more balls to the tone controls! But I sure did miss all that raw power that half stack could produce!
I have a 31 band Graphic EQ, I use it in my FX loop of my amp. You should check out what I've achieved with the EQ. I used it to replicate the Master of Puppets tone and I believe I've gotten very close, contrary to what people think, Metallica does NOT just cut the mids, They really manipulate exact mid range frequencies rather then just scoop them. They used a Para-metric while only have a Graphic. Also Randy Rhoads relied heavily on an EQ pedal to get his tone, As well as Dimebag, Kerry King.... ETC
I use my MXR 10 band EQ to clean up the low end on my six string bass and fine tune the high end. Switching over to guitar the ability to tone change is amazing.
I use two Source Audio EQ2 pedals on my bass pedalboard. One is a crossover with a compressor through the low channel and dirt pedals through the highs for parallel processing. The other is an overall midi controlled EQ for my effected signal and my clean out. Oh and the second one is also used as a volume pedal for my effected signal and my clean out. I went down a RUclips pedalboard rabbit hole when I was sick in bed with COVID-19 over the new year.
ahhhh good point. I have a little fender greta with the single tone knob. I have to keep it all the way up or it sounds bad. I hate that tone knob. I commented earlier about not knowing if I need one for my main egnator tweaker amp because it sounds great and is very flexible, but I didn't even think about the greta
I had an MXR 10-band eq that I used for my 5-string basses. It stopped working after a few years. I used it to push up deep bass and upper mids to get a deep and cutting sound. I have active basses, and I usually leave them flat and the amp or control board flat. The system sounds good flat, and I only did a little tweaking. I tested my hearing using an online test through my headphones that go from 5 to 35k. On the bottom, I can hear to about 28 or 29 Hz, and about 15k on the high end. With the volumes I put my ears through, I'm surprised my hearing is this wide. I used it to make smaller rather than larger changes to my tone.
I like your analysis on conservatively using EQ application and placement of EQ in the signal chain. Well explained with examples. I will need to unlearn, rewind and relearn. Oh and the Boss EQ-200 is really nice.
Thank you soooo much!!! I've been waiting for your take on this subject for awhile now. You're the master of concise when it comes to gear breakdowns and sound knowledge. Thank you for amazing content!
Aw maaaaan, I only just found out the Target Mids pedal ever existed! It's what I've been looking for! My favoured tone has a 3kHz presence, and nearly all EQ pedals studiously avoid that frequency in a way that annoys the heck out of me. Currently running an Artec Parametric Equalizer & considering building a 3 band parametric if I get obsessed enough to take on the rabbit hole that entails. I adore the Parametric mids on my mixing desk and remain baffled that guitarists rarely understand parametric EQ. It appears to be why people complain bitterly about the Metal Zone ... whereas , if I ran the world , there would be many Distortions, Fuzzes, & overdrives with that EQ architecture. The unexpected success of the JHS Haunting Mids is; baffling, surprising, overdue (particularly from your point of view) and very, very welcome.
Beyond the usual product placement razzle dazzle seen in several videos, this video does an excellent job of detailing when and how to use an EQ pedal (and when not to use one). Big thanks!!
When you're EQing things on a mixing console, one excellent method is to boost significantly, and then sweep the frequency around until you find the worst possible sound, then instead of boosting, cut that frequency. I'm sure the same principle would work with an EQ pedal through a guitar amp. To find the most particularly offensive frequencies if you're struggling. It's basically like putting your tone under a magnifying glass to find the worst part and then taking care of it.
@@miltonbates6425 True. I was thinking something along the lines of a tom drum or something and then extrapolating that to a guitar EQ pedal. If you hear some horrible sort of sound and you can't quite figure it out, what you do is just boost a ton, like 12-15 dB, in a narrow Q just to locate the offending frequency. Then once you've located it you take it back to 0 and then cut from there until that nasty sound is gone.
Pretty sure it was you who taught me about the FX loop EQ trick. Best tone I’ve ever had has been from my MXR 6 band running through the loop on my Blackstar HT5.
Awesome video. I love EQ pedals. I used to run one before my amp as kind of an overdrive and one in the loop for solo boosts. I love being able to dial in the exact frequencies you want to cut/boost. I also had a Fender Super Twin amp with built in foot-switchable parametric EQ. Not the greatest amp but that was an awesome feature.
I'd like to see you tackle a video where you explain the meaning behind words used to explain tone. When people call an amp "boxy", "colored", "brown", "bright","dark","muddy", etc what that all means in guitar slang.
I owned a 10 band eq pedal for about a year before I actually unboxed it and used it. I bought the 50w EVH EL34 head and the Blue channel was a bit "muddy" and "distant" sounding on its own. People had told me that I needed to do the "C137 mod", snipping a specific capacitor out of the amp circuit. I didn't want to alter my amplifier and dug out the eq pedal. I see no reason to modify the amplifier when I use the eq pedal in the loop. And once I started using an eq pedal I couldn't figure out why I never used one before, and why I owned this one for so long without using it sooner. It is an "always on" pedal. If anyone is on the fence about whether they need an eq pedal or not, I would highly recommend they try one out.
I use an EQ pedal to drop the overall level of signal, and a tiny bit of the bass frequencies, as trying to dial a bedroom volume with the volume knob alone is super iffy and one millimeter sideways makes an enormous difference, and the bass drop is a nice bonus as although I love the tone of my amp, the bass is slightly too pronounced even when the bass knob on the amp is set to 0.
I wish all pedal related videos were this informative! Going to be switching between a Les Paul and Jazzmaster live so wanted to make sure I understood EQ. Thanks so much for this video!
For a good lead tone, thanks to my Caline 10 band EQ pedal, I take the 125hz right down to -12. Then I turn the 2khz right up to +12. Then 16khz right down to -12khz. Then lowest bass (31.25hz) up to +6. Then 'join the dots' of these four with the other sliders to form a saw tooth pattern. Set and forget EQ and enjoy playing
SO many people I know need to see this. How about one regarding where the guitar sits in the frequency range (shelving?) I know it was touched in the "How to not dial in a metal tone!".
thanks so much ....nowhere better explained than here now. This pedal looks intriguing for the possibilities to sculpt your sound far deeper than using the traditional three knobs. Well done.
My Boss EQ is probably the one pedal I will NOT get rid of. Between an overdrive and the amp I can get my 'sound' reasonably on just about any amp and/or recording input.
Here is a possible 6th: as part of a direct chain. Can emulate cab eq curves to a degree. At least that is the thought that I have atm. In my bit of thinking here, and could be wrong and don't have a way to test this yet, using distortion pedal(s) and other effects as a pre-amp of sorts, eq at tje end to shape the sound more like a cabinet's freq curve. Should make it easier for ITB manipulations. Thinking along the lines of get the sound you want before the box, before the mix, before the mastering.
Great Vid. BOSS EQ pedals have been a staple is zillions of peoples' rigs for ages. This one looks even better. The little display is a nice visual aid too. I like that it's big and chunky too. Looks like it should last.
I use the free the tone eq for balancing levels and tones of different guitars, solo boost and also as a telephone effect. The free the tone has heaps of midi presets. I have one preset that gives more highs as I reduce the volume via midi expression. Boss one looks good too but 5 presets just isn't quite enough now I'm using it. Might have to play with EQ in the loop as well.
![Bucket Brigade Devices: How Analog Delay Pedals Work | Too Afraid To Ask [Xvive Echoman V21]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/3-ObR3oEhWs/mqdefault.jpg)
![Bucket Brigade Devices: How Analog Delay Pedals Work | Too Afraid To Ask [Xvive Echoman V21]](/img/tr.png)
Setting an EQ pedal to get the best tone can be tricky, but understanding how and when to use an EQ pedal couldn't be simpler.
This video looks at 5 ways to effectively use the BOSS EQ-200, a ten band graphic EQ, to improve your guitar sound.
BOSS EQ-200:
www.thomann.de/gb/boss_eq_200...
www.boss.info/uk/products/eq-...
Thanks to Boss for sponsoring this video.
#CSGuitars #EQ200 #BOSS #EQpedals
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Great video as always Colin. I stumbled into EQ uses after chasing Josh Homme's tone for years specifically, the tone on Songs for the Deaf. Once going so far as buying a very used Ampeg VT22 that was way to loud, weighed 100 lbs, and required a small fortune I didn't have to bring it up to spec. I later settled on a Catalinbred SFT, but I still could get that "rip" I was after, but after watching the Sound on Sound video featuring the producer of that album and how he generally got the tones I knew what I needed. As soon as I slapped an EQ on that pedal and boosted the mids I had it. From then on, an EQ is one of my favorite "secret sauce" pedals, and is a Swiss Army knife in the studio.
Cheers!
Damn now I kinda want the precision EQ Pedal
I have an MXR 10 band eq and I use it quite sparingly as well. These can be especially effective if someone is using several different gain pedals. Since the tone of each of the pedals can be radically different, once you get a decent tone set, the eq can help balance the ones that need the most help. Also, there are what are called 'parametric' eq pedals out there that, rather than isolate single bands of eq to cut or boost, they take entire frequency ranges and boost/cut them. The drawback to these pedals is that you usually only get 3 or 4 ranges to adjust rather than the 7 to 10 you would normally get with a 'graphic' eq pedal.
That being said, most mfx pedals these days generally have both graphic and parametric eq options in them, so if the Boss EQ-200 is too expensive, a pedal like the Zoom MS-70 has several different eq options in it that work just as well.
Great video as always mate !!! Thanks for sharing your knowledge and for shedding light on the use of this pedal. I definitively need an EQ pedal on my rig now
EQ is The most Powerful tool for sculpting sound in amps PA's & studio's , then compression , reverb delay….
EQ pedals are also good for getting rid of all the mids before you add all the gain and more gain, from your metal zone
#ScoopTeam
Personally, I boost the shittt out of mids (and aggressively *cut the bass*... this might be the most significant aspect) BEFORE distortion for a tiiiiight n heavy tone
@@TylrVncnt Lol, my comment was more a joke, but yeah I've also especially when jamming with my buddy , boost the mids more. It helps to bring some fuller tones to the sound. but when I am jamming on my own then I cut the mids again for that thrashy tone
I have a metal zone and was gonna do this, thanks lol
Couldn't have said it better
I work as a sound engineer (mainly live sound but a little bit studio stuff too) and I am a big fan of reductive usage of EQ. "Take away few frequencys that sound bad, and the leftover WILL sound good."
Fully parametric or only semi parametric, I always do it like this: turn the gain of that freq.band up, mess around with the frequency knob (EYES CLOSED) and find where it sounds the most bad, then stop there, and turn the gain down of that freq.band.
I really rarely use EQ to boost anything, and I think specially guitarists should use this method primarily. That is why I thought that your "Target Mids"-pedal was so great product, but as u said, if your tone sucks, then no amount of EQing isn't gonna fix it, its the rest of your signal that needs to be fixed. Great video and Terveisiä from Finland!
I like boosting more as a studio engineer, but im only talking about wide q analogue eqs on desks
And do the sweep thing with plugins
Nice! I think that reducive EQ in live sound works better and especially when mixing monitors. When u boost freqs, (mainly highs and high mids) they can (and often will) cause feedback. But if u are not boosting the highs, but rather cutting the unwanted muddynes, then u can just turn the whole monitor up and that will cause a little bit less feedback.
Of course in studio with no live monitoring feedback problems and with good gear that isnt noisey, boosting EQ is fun and more effective and faster way to get your tones to sound good. And I totally dig that
@@JuveriSetila also its way harder to get low end in your mixes (target market is a lot of headphones and bluetooth speakers) so to get low end out of i.e. a kickdrum you almost have to boost
I've seen that method used to remove resonance freqs, it's a great little quirk!
Do a TATA for what the numbers after AlNiCo pickups mean (III, V, etc.)
They don't use roman numerals and the wikipedia article goes very in-depth. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alnico
The gist is that the higher the number the stronger the magnetic pull is. The stronger the magnetic pull, the higher the potential output the pickup has.
Alnico 2 magnets give the most sustain because the weaker magnetic pull lets the strings ring out for longer.
@@ErebosGR can't read, need video!
ErebosGR they also have different natural harmonic differences
@@ErebosGR When they 1st replicated Eddies Frankenstien the pickup show 0 on the meter. They thought they messed up but it was a low output AlNiCo ii magnet i've gone almost all Alnico 2 & 3's .
@@utubehound69/videos 0 what? Ohm? The magnet doesn't affect the resistance of the pickup. Remove the magnet and the pickup would measure at exactly the same Ohm as before.
If they measured output voltage, then a very weak magnet could show close to 0V, if their meter wasn't very accurate. Only with a non-existent magnet would the pickup measure 0 mV in output.
Sounds like another bullshit story that gets passed around without making any sense.
The more I watch these videos, the more I feel I should have gotten a degree in electrical engineering :)
if you love math and story problems, then yes you should have. That's what the whole deal is really all about. There is a practical side too. Being a natural tinkerer is half of the battle. I saw math wizards go thru the program with me who aced the tests (always all story problems all the time) but couldn't find the hot end of the soldering iron or even assemble simple crap in the labs. fvcking useless math students. Use these videos and do a bit of further research and you will get all the EE theory you need. (except maybe for tubes. those are special). stick with colin. Also there are a lot of astute commenters in these vids.
You ve no idea how hard it is. The maths are cancer..
@@alexandert696 depends what you're doing, but the vast majority of the math is algebra. There's a linear relationship between voltage and current for Ohmic devices, exponential for BJT, and quadratic for MOSFETs. There is some calculus involved in the derivation for these concepts, but it isn't *too* difficult (unless you're doing antenna design or something).
You can always start learning! Start from basic physics (electromagnetics), a simple circuit analysis course (they offer them online for free), move into solid state physics & semiconductors, learn about PN junctions, BJTs, MOSFETs, feedback, and op-amp design, and you'll be good for pedal design.
You can always go the digital route and take an introductory digital design course, learn a language to program an FPGA (Verilog or VHDL) or a microcontroller (C, C++, even Python now), and create some fun gadgets this way, but you'd still need to know some circuit design to create the board to power your FPGA or microcontroller.
Anyways, there are a ton of resources online, so you can definitely learn this stuff without going to school.
@@stephenjbro that's true, for the little I have done of electrical engineering on my own, it felt Indeed that the math is not too complex. I'd imagine it gets worse with DSP related stuff :)
Put eq pedal in effect loop in your amp and it will change everything.
ESPECIALLY with a Hot Rod Deluxe. The drive channels on it were SO poorly EQ'd from the factory, but I dropped a Boss GE-7 in the effects loop, and it's made a whole world of difference. Doesn't sound like canned dogshit anymore.
I use my MXR ten band EQ in the effects loop and it does a great job. In front? Meh. It's okay. But, putting an EQ in the loop really makes it come alive (and your sound, as well).
That's exactly what I do too. Take a high gain noisy amp, 10 band EQ to pump in the frequencies with a noise reduction unit thru the loop and you're set.
Indeed, massive improvement. Can also be used as a "kind of" attenuator, if you lower the volume, it pushes the power tubes harder.
a $25 Behringer eq in the EL of my (modded) JCM 900 DR... unreal.
3:00 Your tinnitus damaged hearing. 😂 I hear what you did there.
I still just hear a ringing sound oh wait that’s tinnitus 🤬 the bells the bells😫
could you explain?
@@Fedethedangerous95 He plays a very high frequency (around 16KHz) in the background while he says "Your tinnitus damaged hearing." Tinnitus is a health condition a sufferer's symptoms are often that they hear a loud ringing noise (high frequency) which has not been emitted from an outside source. [1] It is a joke about the condition to try and describe one of the frequency bands.
[1] NHS: www.nhs.uk/conditions/tinnitus/
@@samsanders8545 Oh, okay, thank you! I wasn't sure
@@Fedethedangerous95 no problem!
I didn't expect to learn that much from this video, this is now my tone tweaking bible.
You didn't expect to learn something from a CSGuitars video? That was a mistake.
@@ScienceofLoud note to self : don't be stupid anymore.
@@ScienceofLoud 🤘🤘🤘all the gain!!!!!!!!🤘🤘🤘 that's the most common mistake
Good work young man...Im an old duffer...who's enjoyed a life as a pro musician..if these videos were around when I was starting out I could have saved a lot of time.. essentially learning the hard way was how we did it back then. Cheers.
The two downvote guys:
" The treble-cut knob on my axe is the only EQ I need!"
An EQ pedal can be used as a bit of a treble booster. Speaking of treble boosters, do a TATA about that.
Simple: Laney TI Boost. End of story.
Tony Iommi and Brian May use them.
Enough said.
@@dionr1168 Don't forget Rory Gallagher, who introduced Brian May to the Rangemaster Treble Booster.
WORST CHANNEL EVER one of those guys eh? Bet you’re real fun at parties.
Excellent info, i was looking how to cut feedback out.
This is the best video on RUclips regarding the practical applications of EQ.
Colin, you are the only guitar advisor I have watched on this subject who advocates just using cut (mostly). You blaze your own path, sir.
9:37 - Kerry King of Slayer does this in front of a JCM 800.
This is why i love your content. Didn't even realize how much one of these might come in handy.
Damn. That new BOSS pedal is sweet.
Is it just me, or has BOSS been killing it recently?
Boss has always been killing it.
You get mega love for "Run Like Hell"! Great video! Your channel is an inspiration!
This pedal is seriously tempting. I have a modded ge7 on my board, I mainly use it to even out the bass between the clean and gain channel of my amp, an unusual use Maybe but it is necessary with my current rig, the clean channel has soo much more low end than the gain channel. I also use it to tune to whatever room I'm playing in. Sometimes the slightest bump in the 800hz range can be the difference between being able to hear your tone clearly or not in some rooms.
I got the boss eq-200 last week. All I can say is that once you go Eq, you ll never go back. It really expands your tone, especially for clean tones. The door has been opened and it’s a whole new world!
I've heard that EQ pedal can be used as a clean boost to either bring the grit up on cleaner overdrive pedals or boost the signal after the overdrive.
Absolutley. I've got my eq pedal in front of a moog drive pedal that reacts and blooms beautifully to the tone tweaking that precedes it.
Did you watch the video? He said exactly that
Not sure why I bothered watching 20 other videos on EQ before watching this.
Once again, excellent explanation. One of RUclips's born teachers.
Another great video Colin. That Boss eq is mighty impressive
I have a TATA: What does sag actually sound like? I know what it is from a technical standpoint but I am having a hard time trying to hear in my head what sag isolated actually sounds like.
That little high-frequency ring as you said "tinnitus-damaged hearing" was a nice touch
Will Carter that ducked me up dog. I was like Damn not again!
The little high-frequency ring wasn't just when he said "tinnitus-damaged hearing", I heard it througout the video
I've only been using my Behringer EQ with mids boost all the way ať +15 dB with my Les Paul and bass amp to get overdrive, lol
But Colin, without your help, people won't know how to use this thing to SCOOP THE MIDS!
Or give them ALLLLLLLLL THE GAIN!!
you mean,
Scoop the MEDS, so that you can't be HAIRED?
Scoop mids and boost them on amp
Yet AGAIN- Gold info here that actually works- as with passive vs active pickups,and tube screamer as boost - now EQ in the loop with minor adjustments - excellent stuff man devoid of BS 👍🏻
Parametric EQs are delicate and precise, like the one on the Boss MetalZone…
I like using and EQ as a high pass, then follow that up with a reverb with a shimmer effect. Fun atmospheric tone.
“They can’t boost what’s not there” & the idea of take away bad first before adding good... BEST advice for any mixing! Most sound engineers try to aim a few spots at 0 as the loudest and then bring up everything else to match/balance. Only then bumping a few small spots over 0 only as necessary. Notice at 11:33 and on how his EQ is balanced around the midline. Tasty mixes, but only making a great sound even better... not making “chicken salad” as the saying goes. 🤙
All praise the Algorithm. I have the MXR 10 band EQ and found out through much experimentation that this is my best tone. All amp EQ at noon. Dial in the best clean tone with no effects. Then set the EQ pedal to a flat line, with the amp controls still at noon, then find what works. Then start adding in one pedal at a time, in different combinations and different places in the chain. There are two vital sliders on the MXR. Gain and volume. The gain will boost the clean signal to the point it breaks up, pushing the amp into overdrive. Then you're cooking with gas.
One quick tip from a sound engineer, while lower mids(the warmth and the "balls" of the tone) is usually the part that we first target, there is no reason to have anywhere betwen 30-150 boost for a 6 string guitar, since usually sound engineers cut those, in generally (many variables) those are mud, that you don't need in a full mix, I repeat IN A FULL MIX. So be aware at the mid bass territory, since it's mud usually and it just makes the mix unclear, leave that for the bass to handle and for the sound engineer to mix that.
This has gotta be the best guitar gear related channel on RUclips.
Yay someone else that defines bass, mids and treble frequency ranges at the same exact spot as me (0-300hz, 300-4khz, 4khz-20khz.)
We're definitely right.
I don't know why but in school we were told that midrange band is from 300Hz to 3000Hz.
@@vidanmitkovski7785 That's reasonable 3-5k it's hard to say exactly
A cool trick I figured out for myself. To find out approx. what frequencies your knobs are adjusting. Record your playing, however you want, into a DAW. Pull up a visual EQ graph. Play normal. Adjust one of the knobs to the max and play again. Look at what areas changed the most.
Holy cow, amazing video! I don't even want an EQ pedal but what I learned about frequencies and how they affect your tone is amazing.
7:55 I’ve found this to be so true. For several years I tried getting my Supro TremoVerb to work with an MXR 10 band EQ pedal, but found a world of difference in my tone when I switched to my current Princeton Reverb. Now I don’t even use the EQ pedal on my Princeton, but reserve it for the Right side of my stereo rig to my Champ to sculpt it’s tone.
Seriously though, it’s worth the effort and experimentation to find an amp that really fits the tone in your head. I had to compare both those amps together to know, but when I did, it was pretty clear that the rest of my rig was better suited to be amplified through the Princeton.
Nice to hear "Run like Hell"
First I thought this guy is just some sound tech one of milion but after seeing that right wristband so tight thinking his even equalising his own blood flow I now know your eq master. Great video really helped me understand more about tone frequency.
I love my Boss parametric EQ, I've used it religiously for about 25 years now. I would buy one from you in a heartbeat
BRILLIANT discussion on using an EQ! This is a huge help
Subscribing to your channel has helped my brain process a better understanding of your motherland's heavy dialect. Especially for watching movies made in your part of the world. I know the language is English based, but my ears are not locking on to what some words are spoken, and I am a college educated American. Your guitar knowledge and playing ability is tops. Your knowledge of the physics behind electronic wizardry suggests to me you have a college degree in sound engineering. Thank you for being on YT and more people should be your subscribers because your tutorials are top shelf.
Best video I have seen explaining while showing the results of a EQ.
With the “boost wide, cut narrow” thing, the Josh Homme “Songs for the Deaf” Studio Tour thing Springs to mind. Maxed out 1 mid band in 2 consecutive graphic eq pedals into an Ampeg. Possibly an example of a “all rules exist to be broken” mentality?
“An abrasive compound for polishing turds!”
CLASSIC
Okay, Here we go again. You use your Bass, mid and treble on your amp to get your basic tone, Then you use your resonance and presence to adjust your tones tone. And then! you use your EQ pedal to spice up the tones tone tone.
Imagine a steak, you cook it with the amplifier and its ready to eat, But you can always use a sauce AKA the resonance and presence, And then you add the salt and pepper AKA the EQ pedal.
triledink
And if the steak is big enough to create sag in your stomach, you'll produce the brown sound
@@gvtshorts2024 AHA!!!! Good one
I think the steak is the base tone, but seasonings are tone and presence, not the sauce.
Best EQ lesson I've ever watch!!!
I find them really handy if I am using an amp that isn't mine and I can't tweak all that much (like at a jam night). Just gives me some control from the pedal board!
PATREON NOTIFICATION SQUADDDD
Assemble!
@@ScienceofLoud *plays the avengers theme on a kazoo*
I've been using an EQ in front of the signal chain just to cut some of the low end. Makes your metal tones brutal and tight as heck.
Check mark with the 400 at the lowest point and 1.6 highest then slight drop off on the treble. Boss 7 band eq, 6505mh, worked for me.
Very smart use and demo at 11:28
I Had a HIWATT Custom Lead 100 Half stack years ago. I left it unmodified internally. The resulting tone was SOOO Trebly, even with the tone controls reducing the highs and some mids, also Presence control at zero!! ( was playing a Univox Strat copy. Very trebly also) One day, I wired up my Radio Shack 7-band EQ into my signal chain and dropped (attenuated) 75% of the high freqs and some upper mids out of the signal, and like one Live sound guy mentioned, adjusted to "feel". My rig never sounded so sweet!! I wasn't hip to all the capacitor substitutions I could also have done to the Amp and guitar internal electronics, at the time, so, I ended up selling my HIWATT for something smaller, with more balls to the tone controls! But I sure did miss all that raw power that half stack could produce!
i dont know how much that thing is but the boss ge7 is my go to and it wont break the bank.
I'd love for you to do a "TATA: Effects Loops". Great, informative content. Keep up the good work!
I have a 31 band Graphic EQ, I use it in my FX loop of my amp. You should check out what I've achieved with the EQ. I used it to replicate the Master of Puppets tone and I believe I've gotten very close, contrary to what people think, Metallica does NOT just cut the mids, They really manipulate exact mid range frequencies rather then just scoop them. They used a Para-metric while only have a Graphic.
Also Randy Rhoads relied heavily on an EQ pedal to get his tone, As well as Dimebag, Kerry King.... ETC
I use my MXR 10 band EQ to clean up the low end on my six string bass and fine tune the high end. Switching over to guitar the ability to tone change is amazing.
Was actually looking at getting an EQ pedal soon, so this helped a lot.
I love the ability to have a memory on this box, thanks Colin because I just bought one now on Reverb !
The infamous, Wilhelm scream, caught that right away, used in hundreds of movies it seems
I use two Source Audio EQ2 pedals on my bass pedalboard. One is a crossover with a compressor through the low channel and dirt pedals through the highs for parallel processing. The other is an overall midi controlled EQ for my effected signal and my clean out. Oh and the second one is also used as a volume pedal for my effected signal and my clean out. I went down a RUclips pedalboard rabbit hole when I was sick in bed with COVID-19 over the new year.
Congratulations! I discover your channel by the chapter called "What´s a piezzo pickup". Now I am learnig alot about pedals and others stuff! Thanks!
great choices of songs and licks for the examples, this made the comparison very easy to hear.
Please explain all about Wah Wah pedals
👇
An EQ pedal can be very useful for Orange Micro/Dark Terror amps or Joyo BantAmps which only have a single Tone knob.
ahhhh good point. I have a little fender greta with the single tone knob. I have to keep it all the way up or it sounds bad. I hate that tone knob. I commented earlier about not knowing if I need one for my main egnator tweaker amp because it sounds great and is very flexible, but I didn't even think about the greta
I had an MXR 10-band eq that I used for my 5-string basses. It stopped working after a few years. I used it to push up deep bass and upper mids to get a deep and cutting sound. I have active basses, and I usually leave them flat and the amp or control board flat. The system sounds good flat, and I only did a little tweaking. I tested my hearing using an online test through my headphones that go from 5 to 35k. On the bottom, I can hear to about 28 or 29 Hz, and about 15k on the high end. With the volumes I put my ears through, I'm surprised my hearing is this wide. I used it to make smaller rather than larger changes to my tone.
I like your analysis on conservatively using EQ application and placement of EQ in the signal chain. Well explained with examples. I will need to unlearn, rewind and relearn. Oh and the Boss EQ-200 is really nice.
Thank you soooo much!!!
I've been waiting for your take on this subject for awhile now.
You're the master of concise when it comes to gear breakdowns and sound knowledge.
Thank you for amazing content!
Aw maaaaan, I only just found out the Target Mids pedal ever existed! It's what I've been looking for! My favoured tone has a 3kHz presence, and nearly all EQ pedals studiously avoid that frequency in a way that annoys the heck out of me. Currently running an Artec Parametric Equalizer & considering building a 3 band parametric if I get obsessed enough to take on the rabbit hole that entails.
I adore the Parametric mids on my mixing desk and remain baffled that guitarists rarely understand parametric EQ.
It appears to be why people complain bitterly about the Metal Zone ... whereas , if I ran the world , there would be many Distortions, Fuzzes, & overdrives with that EQ architecture.
The unexpected success of the JHS Haunting Mids is; baffling, surprising, overdue (particularly from your point of view) and very, very welcome.
I'm considering this EQ... Wish it included a preamp/boost for the price...
I just pump the volume and gain up on my eq pedal a bit and keep everything else in the center, I usually use it for a small boost during a solo.
Beyond the usual product placement razzle dazzle seen in several videos, this video does an excellent job of detailing when and how to use an EQ pedal (and when not to use one). Big thanks!!
When you're EQing things on a mixing console, one excellent method is to boost significantly, and then sweep the frequency around until you find the worst possible sound, then instead of boosting, cut that frequency. I'm sure the same principle would work with an EQ pedal through a guitar amp. To find the most particularly offensive frequencies if you're struggling. It's basically like putting your tone under a magnifying glass to find the worst part and then taking care of it.
Sometimes that worst sounding frequency is where the magic is. Don't cut the magic.
@@miltonbates6425 True. I was thinking something along the lines of a tom drum or something and then extrapolating that to a guitar EQ pedal. If you hear some horrible sort of sound and you can't quite figure it out, what you do is just boost a ton, like 12-15 dB, in a narrow Q just to locate the offending frequency. Then once you've located it you take it back to 0 and then cut from there until that nasty sound is gone.
Pretty sure it was you who taught me about the FX loop EQ trick. Best tone I’ve ever had has been from my MXR 6 band running through the loop on my Blackstar HT5.
Awesome video. I love EQ pedals. I used to run one before my amp as kind of an overdrive and one in the loop for solo boosts. I love being able to dial in the exact frequencies you want to cut/boost. I also had a Fender Super Twin amp with built in foot-switchable parametric EQ. Not the greatest amp but that was an awesome feature.
I'd like to see you tackle a video where you explain the meaning behind words used to explain tone. When people call an amp "boxy", "colored", "brown", "bright","dark","muddy", etc what that all means in guitar slang.
I owned a 10 band eq pedal for about a year before I actually unboxed it and used it. I bought the 50w EVH EL34 head and the Blue channel was a bit "muddy" and "distant" sounding on its own. People had told me that I needed to do the "C137 mod", snipping a specific capacitor out of the amp circuit. I didn't want to alter my amplifier and dug out the eq pedal. I see no reason to modify the amplifier when I use the eq pedal in the loop.
And once I started using an eq pedal I couldn't figure out why I never used one before, and why I owned this one for so long without using it sooner. It is an "always on" pedal. If anyone is on the fence about whether they need an eq pedal or not, I would highly recommend they try one out.
I use an EQ pedal to drop the overall level of signal, and a tiny bit of the bass frequencies, as trying to dial a bedroom volume with the volume knob alone is super iffy and one millimeter sideways makes an enormous difference, and the bass drop is a nice bonus as although I love the tone of my amp, the bass is slightly too pronounced even when the bass knob on the amp is set to 0.
I wish all pedal related videos were this informative! Going to be switching between a Les Paul and Jazzmaster live so wanted to make sure I understood EQ. Thanks so much for this video!
this video has helped me better dial in my metal tone than any other video i've seen on youtube so far. Well done again good sir! And thank you
extremely helpful video on how to better use the EQ-200. Thanks for this content
For a good lead tone, thanks to my Caline 10 band EQ pedal, I take the 125hz right down to -12. Then I turn the 2khz right up to +12. Then 16khz right down to -12khz. Then lowest bass (31.25hz) up to +6. Then 'join the dots' of these four with the other sliders to form a saw tooth pattern. Set and forget EQ and enjoy playing
Just bought this pedal. Best video on it!
The lower and upper mids are often called resonance(lower) and presence(upper) on amps typically hooked into the power amp.
"Not an abrasive compound for polishing turds"
You, sir, are a scholar, a gentleman, and a poet.
SO many people I know need to see this. How about one regarding where the guitar sits in the frequency range (shelving?) I know it was touched in the "How to not dial in a metal tone!".
thanks so much ....nowhere better explained than here now. This pedal looks intriguing for the possibilities to sculpt your sound far deeper than using the traditional three knobs. Well done.
Great video, but we the average person only hears up to around 12Khz-15Khz (@2:33). 20KHz is used because it is an easy number.
BEST EQ pedal video on RUclips, thanks!
this fully taught me how EQ's work! I had no idea what they even did but now i know a lot more!
My Boss EQ is probably the one pedal I will NOT get rid of. Between an overdrive and the amp I can get my 'sound' reasonably on just about any amp and/or recording input.
That is a massive difference in tone, the palm mutes get fatter with out mud. That's awesome.
Wow what a great video. Channel has come on really well. Last time I watched you was when I modified my wah pedal with true bypass and led.
17:04 If you have not updated to the latest firmware maybe you should as it does not offer 4 EQ presets, it allows up to 127 Presets to be saved. 🙂
It would be nice to hear some of these examples through in a mix.
Here is a possible 6th: as part of a direct chain. Can emulate cab eq curves to a degree. At least that is the thought that I have atm. In my bit of thinking here, and could be wrong and don't have a way to test this yet, using distortion pedal(s) and other effects as a pre-amp of sorts, eq at tje end to shape the sound more like a cabinet's freq curve. Should make it easier for ITB manipulations. Thinking along the lines of get the sound you want before the box, before the mix, before the mastering.
Great Vid. BOSS EQ pedals have been a staple is zillions of peoples' rigs for ages. This one looks even better. The little display is a nice visual aid too. I like that it's big and chunky too. Looks like it should last.
I use the free the tone eq for balancing levels and tones of different guitars, solo boost and also as a telephone effect. The free the tone has heaps of midi presets. I have one preset that gives more highs as I reduce the volume via midi expression. Boss one looks good too but 5 presets just isn't quite enough now I'm using it. Might have to play with EQ in the loop as well.
nice touch 👌🏽 at 2:59 ...unless that was really my tinnitus I was actually hearing 😂👍🏽